A passenger on a flydubai jet credited a TV series about doomed flights with helping him grab the controls when the aircraft began dropping and chaos broke out near the cockpit.
Yaniv Hayoun later returned to Israel in the same bloodstained shirt he wore during the midair struggle, after passengers and off-duty pilots helped get the Dubai-to-Tel Aviv flight onto the ground in Saudi Arabia.
The flight turned terrifying Wednesday when a co-pilot allegedly stabbed flight captain Smit Machchhar and went after the aircraft’s controls, drawing passengers into a fight at the front of the plane.
The jet had been airborne for about two and a half hours when Flightrader24 data captured a sudden fall over Saudi Arabia, with more than 17,000 feet lost in less than two minutes around 05:21.
Aviation signals from the plane then shifted from squawk 7700, used for an emergency, to squawk 7500, used to indicate a hijacking.
Passenger Almog Italie described a normal first part of the trip in a video obtained by Reuters, before the aircraft lurched near the Jordanian border.
“The flight from Dubai was a very calm one for the first two hours. And when we were at the Jordanian border, suddenly the aircraft dropped, like a massive drop, like a massive turbulence for 20-30 seconds. Then balanced, and then once again dropped for 10 seconds and balanced again,” Italie remarked.
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Moments later, Italie saw passengers surge toward the cockpit area.
“And then we saw that in the front of the aircraft there was a riot. Many people rushed over there. Apparently, one pilot stabbed the other,” Italie said.
Hayoun recalled getting the first officer in a headlock as passengers pulled him out of the cockpit, but the aircraft still felt unstable, so he moved back inside.
“I jumped back in there, grabbed the controls, started pulling the controls,” Hayoun said.
Hayoun credited part of that instinct to “Mayday,” the Canadian documentary series known outside the U.S. as “Air Crash Investigations,” which reconstructs real aviation disasters and the failures behind them.
From the show, Hayoun explained, he knew enough to pull the control levers upward while the jet was still dropping.
“The plane started leveling out a little more, and then the pilot told me he was taking over from there,” Hayoun said.
Two off-duty pilots who were also aboard helped stabilize the flight and bring it down safely in Tabuk, Saudi Arabia.
Hayoun was later flown back to Israel, still wearing the shirt stained during the struggle, and kept a bit of space when he met Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu so the blood would not rub onto the premier.
“When I went in, I saw the terrorist on the control,” Hayoun told Netanyahu. “I grabbed the terrorist, put him in a hold, and pulled him outside.”
Netanyahu praised him directly during the meeting. “I see you and I see a lion – a big hero,” Netanyahu told him.
The suspect has not been publicly identified, and the knife attack allegedly left Machchhar injured but still able to alert people outside the cockpit and get the door open so passengers could reach the front.
By the time help arrived, the co-pilot was allegedly hitting the plane’s control panel.
Zvika Meness, another passenger, told Israeli public broadcaster Kan News that people aboard restrained the attacker “with his own zip ties and with the multimedia headphones.”
Meness also described the fear among families on the flight.
“There are children and families here who have been through a very severe, highly traumatic event,” Meness said.
Asaf Rajuan, one of the passengers who helped restrain the attacker, framed the response as something that happened before anyone had time to weigh the risk.
“This is something you do without thinking, just running to save your daughter’s life, your family’s life,” Rajuan said.
Netanyahu said Sharir and the other passengers “saved many lives and displayed great bravery” when they intervened during the flight.
“They prevented a serious tragedy,” Netanyahu added.
The aircraft was carrying at least 150 people, and Netanyahu said “almost all” of the passengers were Israeli while also saying the pilot accused in the stabbing had been arrested and was being investigated by Saudi authorities.
Machchhar was in stable condition, according to the Indian embassy in Saudi Arabia.
Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz called the incident “an attempted jihadist terror attack” and gave the starkest official description of what investigators believed the attacker was trying to do.
“According to the preliminary information available to us, the terrorist had one intention: to crash the aircraft with everyone on board,” Katz said.
An Israeli security official told CBS News that Israel is examining whether the episode was meant to be a Sept. 11-style terror attack and whether the attacker had help.
Flydubai runs daily return flights between Dubai and Tel Aviv, a route popular among Israeli nationals that normally passes through Saudi and Jordanian airspace, and officials said the plane reached Tabuk safely with everyone on board alive.
Flydubai used narrower language in its statement, confirming that an “altercation occurred in the flight deck” and saying on-duty Flydubai crew members traveling on the plane secured it, diverted it and landed in Tabuk.
The airline did not verify the reported stabbing and said the reasons and motives remained under investigation, while Saudi Arabia’s Tabuk airport told Reuters that both pilots were hospitalized with injuries.
Passengers later left Tabuk on a flight that departed at 17:40 local time and arrived in Tel Aviv around 18:40 local time.
Ron Levi told CBS News the experience left passengers rattled even after they were out of Saudi Arabia.
“It was the most frightening experience we’ve ever had in our lives,” Levi said.
When asked how he was making sense of it, Levi indicated the shock had barely begun to process.
“Honestly, I’m not even starting. We’re all shaking here … I have no idea. I just want to go home,” Levi added.
